Singing sisters from Gilbert getting national interest

For Jonnie and Brookie Allen, school at Highland High is for socializing.

"You guys ready for social hour?" mom Melinda Allen asks when checking whether they are ready for school.

On school days, the girls are at Highland until about 11 a.m. to get in their "difficult" classes such as math and Spanish and hobnob with friends.

At other times, they are busy being Jonnie & Brookie, the pop/Christian rock music duothat has garnered a national following among the 'tweens-and-younger crowd for their wholesome image, catchy music and stylish, interactive delivery on stage.This means practicing, recording or performing most of the year amid online classes from a distant-learning program and homework all year long.

Not everybody at school knows about their musical career, though.

"This year, it got out. This is the first year that really everyone knew," said Jonnie, 17, who will be a senior when school starts Monday.

The sisters may be in the limelight with their musical career, but it's out of their school's spotlight. Only their teachers were formally told by their parents why they spend only a few hours at school or miss days altogether.

"We let the teachers know beforehand that we're gone, because they can get our work ready for us," said Brookie, 15,who will be a sophomore.

Jonnie added: "We don't brag about it at all. It's our job and we love it. It's our form of work. Our form of work is also our form of fun. We love it, and we try to keep our normal student life a little bit."

Homework might be done inside a car or plane. Or, after a concert, in a hotel room.

Yet, they maintain good grades.

"We do not like getting bad grades. We try to stick with A's and B's; we've not gotten anything lower," Brookie said.

They both concur that the new school year may be memorable.

"People started noticing who we are more toward the end of the year. Now, the whole year everyone's going to know about it," said Jonnie. "The entire year, we're going to be known as Jonnie & Brookie instead of the two girls at school. It's gonna be a lot of fun. But it's gonna be a little stressful because we have a lot of different shows and lots of stuff going on here."

Indeed, if their classmates haven't heard of them, lots of other kids across the country have gotten to know the teen singing duo.

In July, they released their sixth CD and first album of original songs, "For Better." They are already working on their seventh CD, yet to be named.

Earlier this year, via a poll that tabulated nearly 9 million votes, they were selected Radio Disney's Next Big Thing; part of the prize was performing on a Disney cruise to the Bahamas.

The win allows them to be heard on a national level via the 24-hour radio network devoted to kids, teens and families.

They also have a spot on the Trinity Broadcasting Network's "iShine KNECT" series, featuring 'tween singers and bands as they share and sing about how they find their identity in Christ.

Across the country, they present concerts during fairs, festivals, church congregations and malls. Later this month, they will perform in Indiana and Ohio.

Closer to home, their performance in April at Freestone Park drew 2,000 people, the largest the town drew for a concert. But spectators, blankets in hand, began arriving two hours before the show began.

The next open air concert in Freestone Park will be in October.

Is life good?

"Yeah," they both echo enthusiastically. "We're having so much fun, it's amazing," Jonnie said.

Melinda Allen discovered her daughter's singing voice during a Christmas choir rehearsal in church. Jonnie was 5 and outsinging everybody. Brookie, only 3, was equally talented. She enlisted them in voice and piano classes.

The girls became Jonnie & Brookie when they were 6 and 4 years respectively, and released their first CD, with Christmas songs, called "No Snow for Christmas," in December 2000.

Today, Jonnie and Brookie both play electric, acoustic and bass guitars while filling in with piano and drums. Their fans generally range in age from 4 to 14.

Their mom said parents find them a good role model.

"It's like how kids relate to Hannah Montana. They're interactive, and that's probably the biggest thing in their shows. They get the kids' attention," she said.

Their squeaky clean, Christian message of strong values and good character - which they promote during their Kids Can Make A Difference character building assemblies in elementary schools - also helps.

"We are trying to be role models for kids," said Jonnie. "We make the right choices. We keep our lyrics really positive."

Melinda Allen doubles as their manager, while father, John Allen, an executive in a commercial printing company, is stage manager and also runs their Web site, jonnieandbrookie.com. Their 27 year-old brother is in the Marines.

"It's a family thing; if we didn't do it as a family, it wouldn't work," Melinda said.

But mom concedes an inevitability:

"This is a hard business to be in. . . . In the music business, people like you one day and not like you, say three years from now. So we really beat that into their heads: this is fun and we'll work hard at it, but if in three years from now if people don't like you, you need to be educated. You need to have a backup plan," she said.

So while a lifetime of music may be appealing to the teens, college is definitely in for Jonnie and Brookie.